I See Myself the Way You Remember Me
by OveliaGirlHaditRight
Summary: The Master of Masters (Sora) changed the past, so that he remained a Heartless when he stabbed himself with the Keyblade of People's Hearts and then Kairi got the Keyblade and saved the day. KH1 AU, basically, where Kairi becomes the protagonist at the end of the game. Request pic from AO3's TechnovoreX.


**Sora's PoV**

The Master of Masters—who was really Sora from a world line where everyone had died in the Keyblade Graveyard _but_ him—had succeeded in his plans to get Kingdom Hearts, and to save his friends, the Foretellers, and the worlds as he had so wanted to.

And the only thing he still needed to do, was to to use the power of Kingdom Hearts to change some of the life experiences that he'd had with his friends: because through a bit of foresight the Master still had via his eye (had someone else taken it and carried it into an even further future?), he could tell that if things in the past didn't get somewhat altered, it would end in disaster for everyone.

So Sora closed his good eye, called upon the power of Kingdom Hearts, and set to work.

His first thought—as it always was—being of Kairi.

…

**Five Years Previously**

**Kairi's PoV**

Kairi was horrified; Sora had just turned into a Heartless to save her… And while she'd felt lost in the moment that it had happened, she'd been hopeful that somehow she could revert him to normal.

But after they had found his Heartless right outside the library—and she, Donald, Goofy, and Heartless-Sora had escaped Hollow Bastion with the help of the Beast—she had to admit that that possibility was seeming less and less likely to her.

Donald and Goofy—as much as they loved Sora—were worried that his instincts would take over, and he'd steal Kairi's precious heart or theirs. But she knew he wouldn't; deep down, he was Sora and always would be Sora. And that's all that mattered.

…And she got the sense that he was trying to show her how to use the Keyblade: something she assumed that she must have gotten when Sora had transferred her heart back to her.

When Kairi swung her Keyblade, Heartless-Sora would jump up into the air to try and push the blade even farther for her—to make the blade move in the wide arc that she needed it to… …Hopefully through all of this, she'd find a way to bring Sora and Riku home.

"Sora… I know the other Princesses think that Ansem has gone into the deepest darkness and taken Riku's body with him… But I promise you that I'm going to get him back! You, too, for that matter!"

This form of Sora just blinked his large, vacant eyes at her. The gaze didn't say much, but Kairi felt it was similar to when he'd looked at her curiously when she'd woken him up on the beach so long ago.

"…Well, Sora, it's bedtime," Kairi decided at last. At first, she'd been unsure about if she was going to let him stay in her room or not… But she knew that they both could use some comfort, so she'd keep him here and just go into the bathroom when she wanted to change and whatnot.

Kairi thought about asking Sora if he wanted to brush his teeth… if he had any—or needed help brushing any hair he might have on this somewhat slimy form of his?—but thought better of it. (she _did_ tie her lucky charm around his right antennaeas an "earring" for him, though)

And speaking of nightly routines… Usually Kairi would have just gone to sleep with her hair messy, but since Sora was here, she thought she needed to be at least a little more presentable for him.

So she brushed her hair, curled up in bed beside Sora, and tried to go to sleep… and to ignore the millions of worries already plaguing her mind.

And she may have been imagining it, but Kairi thought she might have seen Sora's eyes become a bit more orange than yellow before she lost consciousness.

…

For the next few days, Kairi focused on training with Yuffie and Aerith more than anyone else. It wasn't that she didn't trust Donald, Goofy, Leon, Cid, or Merlin, or thought that they'd do badly teaching her… But rather, Yuffie and Aerith were both girls—so Kairi thought that they might better be able to help cater to her strengths.

And Yuffie was somewhat close to Kairi's size and had her energy… and Aerith was as new to combat as the redhead was, so she thought for both of those reasons that this was a good start.

They trained in the underground cavern—Heartless-Sora riding on Kairi's back the entire time she used "the Key"… which sort of made it harder, in some ways, but she appreciated his moral support—and just within two weeks, Kairi felt enough improved that she thought she could probably take on the End of the World and mostly handle it.

Kairi didn't believe that her newfound prowess was due to any inherent talent she had… but rather the Keyblade's own power, and maybe even Sora's heart, as well.

Kairi didn't completely understand how the heart worked yet—she was reading what she could about it in the mysterious "Ansem's Reports"—but she was convinced that Sora's heart had gone into hers when he'd used the Keyblade of People's Hearts to free her. After all, her heart had been in Sora's… so why _wouldn't_ things get messed up when Sora was trying to free hers by having his go into hers? And since his body—what the Heartless had transfigured from—didn't have his heart because it was within her… well, that would be why Sora was a Shadow…

This was Kairi's theory, anyway. But she definitely thought it was Sora's heart in hers that was causing her newfound jump in combat skills. And how she longed to try and reach out to his heart… Or do for him what he had done for her. But there was no time… The worlds needed a Keyblade wielder to close the Door, and the Keyblade of People's Hearts had disappeared after Sora had used it, regardless…

Anyway, it was when Kairi had successfully smacked Yuffie's ninja stars back into her—on the third week where Kairi'd decided that she'd finish this last bout of training and then hightail it into the gummi ship—that Heartless-Sora seemed to be blushing the color of... eggplant? If at all possible?

Aerith was the first to notice this; she was being kind,, in trying to offer Heartless-Sora some of her lemonade—seeming to feel that if she couldn't heal his heart with her magics, then she could at least attempt to aid his soul.

And just out of the blue, when Yuffie was nursing the blow to her chin, Aerith mused, "I wonder why Sora is blushing."

"What?! Sora blushing?!" Yuffie demanded, before Kairi could get her own words in (she had her own theory about this, after all. That Sora was just flustered because he was a gentleman—he always had been to her—and therefore was just sad that Yuffie had gotten hurt). "Yo! You know what I think it is?! Aerith, Sora totes thought I was Kairi when we first met, since he likes her! And maybe having _Kairi _accidentally hit my face lodged that thought back into his brain, and he's embarrassed about it!"

Kairi really didn't know if Yuffie's assessment was correct. At all. But her saying this _did_ seem to embarrass Sora as he jumped down from where he'd been on Aerith's shoulder in eying the lemonade, pulled his antennae over his eyes, and began wobbling towards the entrance to the Magician's Study… But she really couldn't focus on that right now.

"Sora… likes me?" If Kairi was being honest with herself, she felt like she was lying in order to act like she hadn't already guessed that. After all, she had somewhat encouraged Sora and Riku to fight over her, hadn't she? It had all been in good fun… But Kairi, at least now, doubted that any of it had been real—that instead, Sora and Riku had been fighting over a play-wife and nothing more and nothing less.

And ignoring Yuffie and Aerith's nods and words in the affirmative, Kairi turned her attention to Sora… Who had stopped just beside the water and looked like he wanted to drown himself in it, yes… but he was also looking at her sternly, for whatever reason.

…And it was in that moment that Heartless-Sora seemed to morph a bit, and got some sort of mane around his Heartless head… and Kairi had no idea what to do with this knowledge, so she ignored it and moved on (she had no time to do anything else).

…

Kairi was fighting, fighting, fighting—trying to defeat enough Heartless to get some sort of Keyhole to form so that it would create a door they could go through—and she was exhausted… and probably not doing as well as she could have been.

Really, Kairi knew there was no way she could have been a seasoned Keyblade wielder yet—even with Sora's heart fighting alongside hers—but she was still trying, and thanking Donald and Goofy for their efforts that aided her with her every breath…

Though Kairi felt bad about defeating Heartless in front of Sora… as if this was somehow a hint to what would happen to him if he lost himself and began attacking his friends. Kairi wanted to tell him that _that_ would never happen, but the words wouldn't come. So, she just settled on trying to send some sort of telepathic message about it into his heart, as her body focused on the here and now.

…Heartless-Sora's body was focusing on the here and now, too. For right now, he was clawing Heartless after Heartless for Kairi. She was thinking of kissing him on the head for it, and seeing if that would be enough of a reward. The good thing about the mane he had gotten? That when most Heartless tried to get a hand on him they would just get a handful of that fur instead.

Donald was using gravity spell after gravity spell on the tougher Heartless, but Kairi could see he was about to be knocked-out… And Goofy just seemed focused on sending her as much magic as he could.

In her heart, Kairi saw herself using firaga on these new, larger Shadows that were creeping around her—so she thought this was a sign from the Keyblade that this was what she was meant to do here—but she didn't know if she had it within her to be fiery anymore…

And just as that thought seemed to enter her head, Sora looked at Kairi incredulously this time. She didn't know how a Heartless could manage that sort of expression, exactly, but he was a living example of how it _was_ possible.

And taking this as Sora trying to be as verbal with his expertise as he could in his current form, Kairi decided to be brave again and bellowed a "firaga!"—and watched in awe, as a sphere of the flames seemed to dance around her without harming her in the slightest and defeated every enemy in sight.

And there before the quartet, the door to Ansem finally faded into existence. And the friends charged towards it… Sora morphed into the shape of a human again even more as he did so, which Kairi noticed, as she caught his hand with hers.

…

When Heartless-Sora and Kairi were about to say goodbye to each other at Kingdom Hearts—after their heartfelt, temporary farewell to Riku that was still tearing them both apart—Kairi finally figured out what had been going on with Sora and herself.

Because of her guilt for what had happened, she had become a lesser version of herself—turning away from the things she usually would have done.

And Sora had caught onto this, and had tried to tell Kairi about it as much as he could with his looks. This was why he'd transformed when she'd chosen to be clean instead of messy—because he'd wanted to tell her then and there that she was allowed to relax and take it easy—and had even been altered when she doubted his feelings for her, and the embers in her heart.

Sora—perhaps via their connected hearts—had evolved for her, so he could be more himself and everything she could ever need… But since he was still in darkness, he was almost becoming a humanoid version of darkness incarnate now.

And while as a Princess of Light, Kairi should have been sad about this and even have her worries… she couldn't.

Sora was Sora—and would always be Sora—and that's all that mattered.

And how could she see something awful in this, when his intentions were so noble and pure?

He'd evolved for the last time—now pretty much being the boy he once was, even as a Heartless… though his eyes were still yellow, and he still couldn't really speak—when Ansem (who Sora was now almost like, and yet also so different from him) had dared to try and make her fall by saying that Riku's "Giving up already? I thought you were stronger than that!" was for Sora and Sora alone, and could _never_ be directed at her. That no one would ever tell her anything positive at all…

It had been _then_ that Heartless-Sora had somehow learned to fly—and flown up from their plummet, with Kairi in his arms—and said the first thing he'd been able to since he'd received his awful curse: "No!"

They were at the pinnacle moment now, where Kairi had been thinking strongly of letting Sora go back to the Islands since he was mostly himself… and since she didn't want him to be in danger until she found some way to turn him back.

But, having just lost Riku the way they did… this plan they'd come up with, when the Princesses had told them what had happened when the Door to Darkness was closed, went up in smoke.

Sora and Kairi couldn't be without each other on this journey… they just couldn't be, despite it all.

Kairi—even in her inexperience—had saved the world because of their bond and surely that was something to be celebrated. And Sora had defied the laws of nature entirely to become a new kind of champion for her and the worlds.

Sora and Kairi's places remained with each other.

Just as the earth came apart beneath them, Kairi reached forward and grabbed Sora's hand… and found a way to fly _herself_ this time—Donald and Goofy following after her.

And a winding road appeared behind the four, with each of them deciding to hold onto each other's hands this time as they traveled along it.


End file.
